So where have I been?

So where have I been? In that city with the Gateway arch for a professional conference. I hadn’t been there for twelve years. Since I spent five days in the hotel without venturing out, I’m glad I did some touristy things twelve years ago—things like going up inside the arch to see the view. OK, we did go out one night for dinner, but that was in taxis and didn’t really count.

We had some interesting speakers including Bill Rancic, who apparently was the first winner in the TV show “The Apprentice”. I didn’t know who he was, but I guess he brought a little star power to our group. He told some funny stories about how he got into business and a little about the TV show. No great earth shattering insights, just some thoughts about bringing different strategies to different problem solving situations and the importance of setting goals.

Different people have talked to us abut Generation X and the Millenials and their different characteristics and how they think and what they want from a career, that sort of thing. I couldn’t really keep it straight. This time, though, a speaker divided up the 400 or so people in the room into groups according to our birth years. We had enough different aged people to represent all these groups: “Traditionalists”, Baby Boomers, X-ers and Millennials. Then we answered questions about our own experiences growing up.

We covered things like TV shows we watched, what family dinners were like, what we thought of performance evaluations—ten questions all together. Then she had each group report on their answers. It really brought the generational thing to life to hear people talk about their group and how they were shaped and why they do the things they do. Very much fun.

A friend of mine did a workshop on Multi-Cultural Counseling Competency that was very rich in content. She has been training her staff on how to talk to people coming from different backgrounds. She covered womens’ issues, African-American, Gay/Lesbian, American Indian,--all sorts of different perspectives.

Then it was off to New Jersey to see my family there: Dad, sister and brother, nieces and nephews. Dad is 85 and doing better these days in terms of walking. He got some sort of shots that helped him. It had been a year since I had seen him, so it was time to go again. Plus, I love driving alone for seven or eight hours and listening to my iPod tunes coming through the radio speakers. That’s my idea of fun.

Also , it’s hard to sit down at a computer and keep up with blogs in the summer. If it’s nice outside, then I’m outside. What’s that? I should get a laptop and wireless network? Donations cheerfully accepted.